


Your tenderness is paradise

by coops



Category: World Wrestling Entertainment
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-10
Updated: 2019-02-10
Packaged: 2019-10-25 20:12:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,168
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17731877
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coops/pseuds/coops
Summary: The answer is always the same. “Everything is ok, we are ok, I promise you"





	Your tenderness is paradise

**Author's Note:**

> Title from BØRNS - Holy Ghost

“Tell me again,” you say, to be sure. You have to be sure, even though you’ve asked the question over and over again so many times it’s almost like clockwork now. 

The answer is always the same. “Everything is ok, we are ok, I promise you. You’re doing fine.”

Still, you have to exhale loudly, you have to feel your chest thump. 

(you try not to look for the difference in her actions, for the difference in her voice, for anything that could give you a sign that she’s lying)

So, you think. Sure. Ok. 

Maybe you can do this.

Even though your confidence has grown so much lately - not that it was ever really low, per se, but you _know_ , you can feel, the change that has washed over you. Like something superpowered has jacked your self-esteem right up - even though all that. You still have doubts. You still worry.

Not about anyone else. Not really. You like them well enough, sure. 

But her? This has to be right or it wouldn’t work. 

You’re only here because she made you feel so powerful you knew you could do anything as long as she backed you.

You’re only here because she made you strong and fearless and - sure - cocky and slick and unbeatable and strong and clever, everything you truly believe _she_ is.

And when you say they weren’t expecting you? That’s true, they really weren’t.

But she did. 

She always did.

She does, every day. She makes you feel ten feet tall.

So you take care to check in with her regularly, to make sure you aren’t going too far, to ensure she’s ok with the shit you say on the job. 

You know; you do - the grins and the laughs you share when you’re not at work. When you facetime each other. When you catch up in the gym. 

You know she’s fine with everything. Still, it worries you. 

But still, she makes sure she tells you often enough. She makes sure to reassure you.

“I’m okay, love. I wouldn’t be here if you overstepped,” she says, one morning when you’ve had a workout and are in the locker room. Your skin feels sweaty and sticky, your hair is sticking to the nape of your neck. You feel pretty exhausted.

She’s sat on one of the benches by you, slowly rolling her shoulders, trying to get the tension out. She's talking about the very dark welts all across her back, now blossoming into horrendous bruises that you just want to cover with soft touches and take it all away.

You have to stop yourself from staring at the parts of her that you miss, terribly, now that you don’t get to see her as often as you used to. You have to stop yourself from reaching out and pushing her hair out of her face. You have to stop yourself from lightly tracing the battle scars across her body.

You have to stop yourself, you have to. 

Instead, you nod. “I know,” you say, just to confirm yourself. 

“Good. You really don’t have to ask, pretty girl. We good,” she tells you, slowly and kindly and with such warmth you feel it bubble right into your own skin.

“Come on. Let’s go eat, yes?”

You meet up again at some food palace, which suits you fine. Still, ever since this feud started you've been worried about being seen out and about with her. 

She can sense your anxiety while you wait for your food.

“Do you want to eat this back at the hotel?” she offers, and all you have to do is look at her and she's laughing. “Of course you do,” she answers her own question fondly. She kisses your forehead lightly as her order comes first, and heads off, and you think you might be more grateful that she can read you like that than of anything, right now. 

When you meet back up in her room, she’s sat on the small sofa with her feet up and under her legs, scrolling through her phone as she waits for you. 

Her smile makes you stop, for a second. 

You eat together in comfortable silence and even though you miss doing this in actual cafes and restaurants together, it’s still the highlight of your day. Especially when she finishes her food before you and ends up leaning on your shoulder and dozing off while you finish yours.

When you do finish, you place the rubbish left over on the small table just to the side of you, and settle back. Your arm stretches across her shoulder and she moves closer to you and you feel very warm and safe. 

There’s no way you’ll end up napping like Charlotte, though, so you check your phone for a while. Shoot off texts to your mam and to a couple of friends and then check your twitter feed. 

Not long after she stirs, and as she starts to move she lets a groan out, wincing as she attempts to move her legs out from under her. “Not that you’re not the most comfortable person in the world, Becks, but freakin’ _ouch_ ,” she says softly, as she rubs her neck. You make a sympathetic face as she tries to twist and massage the crick in her neck away. 

“Poor Charlie,” you murmur as you move your hand from across her shoulder to rub at her neck as well. Her pout is adorable and you laugh a little. 

*

“Stop moving and let me check you, Becks, come on,” she’s instructing you, as she’s holding your shoulders and is frowning while she tries to keep you still. But, you’re in pain; your ribs are shooting sharp white-hot pain all across your chest. You’re pretty sure they are fiery red and blossoming. You can’t stay still when someone is prodding at your soreness.

Your brow is furrowing heavily, you feel angry and annoyed at everyone and everything; you try to bat Charlotte’s hands away but they just keep coming at you. 

“Stop, would you,” you say gruffly. You’re angry that you allowed yourself to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Annoyed that you got hurt to the point where it was nearly impossible to breathe for a little while. 

She's pushing your top up just a little, carefully and lightly, and you wince and flinch back, but, you let her inspect you. You let her, and you have to bite your tongue in order to not shout or scream or argue.

“What did the doc say?” she asks you, and you try hard to remember what the doctor actually said. “Few weeks off, healed in like 6 if I'm lucky? Fuck that,” you say with more venom than you originally intended. 

Charlotte pulls your top back down and shoots you a look that you know too well. You shrug, then wince.

Charlotte looks amused at that. “Don't be a brat. You need to heal, pretty girl.”

You don't like it, you don't like it at all. 

“I don’t fucking believe I’m out, _again_ ,” you say, and you slam your fist into the nearest wall. 

“Hey, hey, hey, come on,” Charlotte says sharply, grabbing your wrists before you can do it again. “Less of that, please.”

You sigh heavily, and if you’re not careful you know you’ll be crying. But, her hands are warm on your wrists and she’s holding them very carefully and you try to focus on that, instead.

So you close your eyes and try to breathe, in through the nose - out through the mouth - repeat, until you feel calmer. 

When you open your eyes Charlotte is watching you, and you can’t quite work out the look in her eyes. 

“Sorry,” you mutter quietly. 

“S’ok, Becks,” she breathes. “I’m here,” and she rubs her thumb along your wrist. You blink and give a small nod. 

“Can we -”

“Come on,” she says before you even finish your sentence. 

She lets go of your wrists, sliding one of her hands down so that it slips into yours, and then she’s leading you towards the locker room.

She’s still holding your hand as she’s guiding you into your hotel room, later. 

Once she’s shut the door, she guides you over to your bed. You slide onto it, wincing as you go. 

Charlotte busies herself - getting bottles of water to put on the bedside table, making sure the painkillers are nearby - as you try to settle back and find a position that doesn’t make your body scream in pain at you.

Eventually, you find that lying flat will do, for now. 

She appears above you, hair framing her face like a golden halo. You try to smile; it ends up small and watery. 

Her knees bracket your hips and you try not to think too hard about all the things you want -

Her knees bracket your hips and her hands start to play with the pocket in your hoodie. “So, I don’t know about you, but I am extremely hungry,” she starts and grins. “Food? Whatever you want, I’ll go get it,” she offers. You can only nod your head, and you realise just how much this whole injury has made you feel _tired_. 

“Alright. I’ll go get food, you have a sleep,” she says, and you let your eyes close. She laughs softly. “See you in a bit, champ,” she says just as softly, and you feel her, more than see her, move up your body. She kisses you gently on your forehead and then on your cheek and then she is gone, the door shutting quietly.

You are too tired to even contemplate trying to unpack all of that.

*

“One more time,” you say, your legs stretched over hers. Her hands are stroking your ankles. She looks up at you and frowns a little. “Hmm?”

You adjust yourself in your seat, make sure you are facing her properly. “Tell me again,” you say, and this time she gets it. Her face smooths out and she adjusts herself as well, turning in her seat slightly to face you.

“You are doing fine, I trust you with everything. We are good, babe.”

You glance down at your hands. “Sorry. That I keep asking. I just -”

“- I know, love. You can ask as many times as you want. I’ll give you the same answer every time, I promise you.”

You nod and look back up at her. She’s looking at you with such tenderness, you suddenly feel very overwhelmed. So much so that you have to move away from her.

*

You think, drinking in bars and pubs in America is never the same as drinking in bars and pubs back home. 

It’s not just the accents, mind. 

Regardless, you’re currently propping up the end of one of your favourite bars in LA and you’re surrounded by a lot of your friends and you feel pretty content.

You’ve managed to get your head back in gear, post-rib-injury. That was darkness and heaviness that never really sits well in you, but you expected it, going by your reaction to past injuries. so, you knew how to pull yourself out of it. which makes you kind of proud, now that you think about it.

So yes, you feel content and warm and somewhat happy, which is nice. 

You down another whiskey and Carmella is looking at you in what you imagine is disgust. “What?” you say, as you drop your glass on the bar. 

“How can you drink that stuff, Becky. It nasty,” Carmella replies, wrinkling her nose and making a face. Ok, yes, it's definitely disgust.

“Cause I make it work, Mella,” you reply, and smirk as she rolls her eyes at you.

“You try too hard, Becks,” she says, as she picks up the glass of vodka soda the bartender hands her, and goes to join Billie and Peyton at the pool table. 

You turn back to the bar and signal for another whiskey. You definitely aren’t trying too hard, right?

Nah. 

You feel, rather than see, a body press against your back, and you immediately smile. You don’t need to look to know who it is; the perfume alone tells you, but there’s also the weight, the warmth - you recognise all of it.

You push back, still smiling, and their arm comes around your chest and shoulders, pulling you into their chest. You bring a hand up to squeeze their arm.

“Hey, pretty girl,” Charlotte says lowly in your ear, and holy _crap_ the tingles that go up and down your spine. 

“Hey yourself,” you say, tilting your face to the left slightly. “You good?”

Charlotte nods a little, and she leans forward, places a light kiss on your cheek before giving you another squeeze. She moves to stand next to you and waits for the bartender to get to her. 

“Where you been?” you ask, because you know Charlotte is usually one of the first to arrive at any kind of gathering. 

She shrugs and turns to the bartender, who had finally gotten to her. “Vodka martini,” she orders and turns back to you. “Got caught up in a couple of meetings. All good now, though,” she says, and you think she looks very lovely, always, but particularly now - when she has a gorgeous black dress with a cleavage that drops down for days.

“You look very beautiful, anyway,” you say, letting your eyes drift up and down her body. She smiles. “Thank you, kindly,” she drawls in her faux-southern accent, hand on heart. You smirk and turn back to your whiskey as she sips at her own drink. 

She’s watching you as you both drink, her lips curled up into a small smile and you don’t really know what to make of it. So, you concentrate on your whiskey. 

You can’t help but mirror her slight smile, though.

You’re joined at the bar by Bayley, looking very flushed and happy - even happier than usual. “Heyyyy, Charlotte!” she says as she greets Charlotte with a full-on hug that forces her off her chair, just so that Bayley can get her arms around her properly. 

Charlotte laughs and squeezes her back. “Ahh, Bayley, missed you!” she exclaims, and Bayley pulls back, grin still fixed on her face. “I’m so happy you’re finally here!” she says, excitedly, and immediately reaches for Charlotte’s hand, starts to pull her away. “Come on, come on, let’s go play pool!” 

Charlotte laughs again. “Maybe later, Bay. Go destroy those suckers though, ok?” 

Bayley pouts but relents nonetheless. She kisses Charlotte on the cheek, and then turns to you, gives you one as well. 

You both watch her walk back towards the pool tables; Natty says something that makes them both crack up and you think, yeah, these are your people. You love them. Most of them, anyway. 

Your smile doesn’t drop when you turn back to Charlotte. 

-

You wake up the next morning, in a bed that isn’t yours, in clothes that aren’t yours. You feel _awful_ , you just know your head is going to be terrible for the rest of the day. 

The body next to you is warm, their arm slung across your waist. 

You don’t have to open your eyes to know you are in Charlotte’s hotel bed, and she is still dead to the world next to you because for whatever reason you always seem to wake up before her. Just the way it goes.

You sniff and rub your nose and try to move quietly out of the bed before heading to the bathroom. You have a quick shower and wash your face and try to clean the previous nights’ drinking out of you.

Charlotte moves slowly as she walks into the bathroom just as you finish drying your hair. She hugs you from behind, letting her chin rest on your shoulder. You look at each other in the mirror in front of you. 

“Hey, you,” she says in your ear, and you have to stop yourself from shivering. 

“You got me home. How wasted was I last night?” you ask her because you know you had a lot to drink but you didn’t think you were that bad.

Charlotte shakes her head, just a tad, and closes her eyes. “No, you weren’t too bad, my love, I just. Wanted to make sure. You know? That you were safe.”

You swallow thickly and try not to think about all the things your stomach is doing. “Thank you,” you say lowly, and you lean into her.

“Anytime, you know that,” she murmurs, eyes still closed.

You feel content to just stand there, folded into each other, in a bathroom in a hotel in LA. But after a little while, Charlotte gives you a squeeze and then pulls back and you feel the loss acutely. She rubs at her eyes a little and smiles warmly at you, as you turn around to face her.

“Ok, gimme a few to have a shower, then we can go get breakfast?”

You nod and leave the bathroom just as she is shifting out of her sleep clothes.

As you fall back down on the bed, you think of all the ways you feel so lucky to have even a little bit of Charlotte in your life. 

*

Post-match, and you’re trying to calm yourself down. You’re sat on the floor in some empty stairwell - because why not - and breathing heavily. 

You try to shake your arms and you try to shake your legs, get them to stop the adrenaline from running through them, to stop them from feeling like they are going to fall off. You remember your breathing exercises - in through the nose, out through the mouth, slowly, slowly. You stand up. You just can’t stop moving. 

You pace around the little landing you’ve cornered, but then you feel a sudden need to drop, so you crouch, holding onto the railing as you go. Breathe, breathe, breathe, you tell yourself. 

Over and over. 

You wipe the sweat from your forehead, you try to will your heart to slow down.

You groan. This is the worst thing about post-match you, especially when you’ve had a big match and you’ve come out of it doing particularly well. You don’t know how to come down from that high, so it thrums through you.

You don’t hear the footsteps, you don’t notice when someone starts climbing the stairs, and yet when a hand touches your back very lightly, you are not shocked. You are not surprised. You also know who it is (it couldn’t be anyone else, not really).

You still yourself, immediately. You are still facing the wall, so you’ve not looked at her but you know she will have the kindest, the sweetest, concerned look on her face. 

Once you’ve stopped moving, she seems satisfied enough to move her arm around your waist, pulling you gently into her. Your back presses against her front; her other arm is steadying herself as she crouches down to join you. 

You are still struggling to get your breathing under control. 

“Breathe, honey, it’s okay,” she says quietly, and you try. You try. Your other hand - the one not clinging to the railing - presses against your own chest, trying to press on your heart to stop it beating so fast. 

Charlotte slides around your body, moving you a little so that you are both facing each other, her arm still gripping onto your waist. She tenderly pushes away the hair that has fallen into your face, touches across your forehead and down your cheekbones.

“It’s ok, Becky,” she repeats, and you try to nod. “With me, ok? In, out -” she slowly breathes in and out, and as she does she puts her own hand over yours, still on your chest. You close your eyes as you follow her lead and it works, it does. You can feel yourself coming back to normal. 

You open your eyes again - she is watching you and her eyes are so vivid you are thrown, just for a second. You blink, and Charlotte watches you. 

“You can let go, now,” she says, and you know she doesn’t mean - _of the railing_. You know she doesn’t mean, _of your chest_. So, you do. You gulp, and then - 

You don’t mean to cry so much, but there it is. Sometimes you get so overwhelmed that the only way to let it all out is to cry and you hate it - you _hate_ it - but it always seems to happen after big big things have happened in your life. Like, winning Evolution. Like, the TLC match. 

Charlotte just holds you. 

You let go of the railing, you let your arms drop, and she holds you.

By the time you’ve managed to control yourself and stop crying, you’re both sat on the floor. You rest your forehead on her shoulder, take a deep breath, and pull back. 

She lets her hands stroke slowly up and down your back. It is very comforting.

“Sorry,” you mumble, and she breathes a small laugh. 

“Don’t be,” she says, and you look at her, again, properly. 

She’s wearing an old soft hoodie and sweatpants over her ring gear. She looks so soft and warm.

“You found me,” you almost cry again, and she smiles so kindly, so fondly. “I’ll always find you, Becks,” she replies, and you know there and then: she is holy, she is everything that is right in the world.

You take a deep breath then, just to steady yourself. You wipe your eyes and sniff and try to gather yourself. 

Charlotte keeps stroking your back, lightly. It helps you, you feel grounded. 

You look at her again; she gives a tiny smile. “You’re ok,” she says like she’s reassuring you. You nod and she smiles wider this time. “Ok,” she whispers, as she wipes under your eyes for you.

“It’s a lot,” you breathe, and she nods. “I know,” she replies, and she brings her head to yours, resting her forehead on yours. 

“I adore you, you know,” she whispers, and you can’t help it, you really can’t help it, not when she’s saying such tender things to you - you try so hard, but you can’t stop a few tears from rolling down your cheeks. 

“Oh, no no no, sorry baby,” she immediately says, alarmed, pulling back and holding your face. 

You close your eyes and try to squeeze them, to stop the tears from spilling out. You gulp and hiccup and take a deep breath.

“Baby,” she whispers again and strokes your jaw and your cheekbones. 

“I’m ok,” you say, and you are. You are. You’re just...so overwhelmed by everything. 

“Do you want to go? We can go to the locker room, get you in the shower or something?”

You shake your head because you know realistically you have like 3 interviews to do and they are probably searching for you, so the longer you stay away the longer you have to recover and get your head in gear. 

“Okay.” 

She moves back, running her hand down your arms before linking her hand into yours. 

“I don’t deserve you,” you say with a hiccup. She frowns at you. 

“What kind of nonsense is that? You deserve the whole world, Becky.”

You shrug and take another deep breath. “You always know how to make me feel better, huh,” you say, and it’s not a question - more of an observation, but you’re looking at her like she’ll take it all back any second now.

She doesn’t, of course.

She just smiles fondly at you, squeezes your hand. “I’ll always take care of you, if you’ll let me, okay?” she says carefully, and it’s a promise but it feels more binding than anything anyone has ever said to you.

You swallow thickly and look at your linked hands and give a tiny nod.

*

You feel 10 foot tall. Your jacket looks _fire_ , your hair is legitimately the best it’s been in a little while (and your hair has been on point for a while, so that’s saying something), you make the jeans and the kicks you have on work. You love this, the swagger you turn on the moment you walk out. The jut of your jaw. Your chest puffed out.

This has always been your favourite place; you’ve just never really had the chance to feel this good about it. About yourself. Walk out to everyone cheering for you. Chanting for you. 

This is your kingdom. You are the king. Your subjects adore you and you give them all you have in you, to make them happy.

She’s already up there, watching you walk in.

You are already relishing the verbal sparring you’ll have before anything else happens.

She looks fucking glorious in her outfit, as ever.

You are in awe, always, but instead of showing that you glare at her. 

She is your queen, regardless of what _The Man_ thinks. 


End file.
